


Carrion Flowers

by Ubiquitous_Chaos (Chameowmile)



Category: Welcome to Night Vale
Genre: Alternate Universe - Zombies, Cecil is pretty much human, DEAL WITH IT, I swear, Living Tattoos, M/M, Polyamorous relationship, Polyamory, Zombie Apocalypse, because i love those, but there's still some weird stuff going on with him, eventual polyamorous relationship, i just really love zombie apocalypse stories, not canon related at all, what are tags
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-02-08
Updated: 2015-03-07
Packaged: 2018-03-11 03:22:23
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 5,080
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3312059
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Chameowmile/pseuds/Ubiquitous_Chaos
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"He'd honestly always thought the zombie apocalypse would be more fun. Granted, his math-class day-dreams about it had been more focused around him discovering the cure and whatnot, paying little mind to the whole survival factor of it, and so, obviously, were less stressful. It's not as if he actually thought there'd be zombies anyway! If he'd known that he needed to properly prepare for them than he probably would have done more research and spent less time being a complete moron."</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Pretty Things

**Author's Note:**

> My love for zombie stories knows no bounds  
> Also I have no self control so even though this was originally meant to just be Cecilos, It became Cecearlos instead, soooooo  
> have fun lol
> 
> I'm very bad at writing in third person, so this is technically a failed experiment, so if anything sounds funny, or the thought processes just seem weird in general, that's why, lol. I'll be going back to second person for everything else I post from now on.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Carlos has no life and likes to watch pretty men succumb to heatstroke.

Now, how in the world did a pretty thing like that manage to last this long?

  
He must be deadly, Carlos decides, frowning a little to himself as he peeks out his bedroom window at the man.

  
His home is actually visited fairly frequently by people these days, seeing as it's just above an abandoned CDC laboratory, but he never shows himself, not anymore. People get angry when they find out that he doesn't have the cure, that he's just living here sitting things out, and so, there's not much point or logic in it.

  
Sometimes they break in, which used to be frightening, but now he's got a few shot-guns on hand to deter them when they do.

  
As for this man, he showed up at around noon, panic sheer on his face and indicative of some potential danger that Carlos personally doesn't want to get involved with.

  
He's a handsome man, he admits, pretty, and probably about Carlos' own age. His pale skin is pink with the cold at the moment, and the way that he's stumbling about suggests that he might also be suffering from a fever.

  
No matter.

  
Carlos knows better than to give in to sympathy. There's blood on the man's shirt-collar, he's probably been bit, so the infection will finish him off before long and there's no point in getting attached, or wasting supplies on a lost cause.

  
He's been watching the stranger for a while now, but the sun is beginning to set, and he decides that there really isn't any point in him staying up. The man is clearly too weak to even attempt breaking down his door, and really, even if he did, what would he do once he got inside? Pass out? He probably wouldn't even make it to the stairs.

  
As if on cue, the man stumbles one last time and faints. Or maybe he's dead. Either way he's lying on the ground now.

  
Carlos studies him for a moment longer, taking in his features now that he has a clear view of the man's face.

  
He's pale, very pale, something he'd already noticed, but also notably sunburnt, possibly from just today alone. It's a little known fact that the sun is actually strongest on the days that it seems like it's weakest.

  
His hair is a pretty beach blonde, thinning a bit, but not notably so, and he's wearing a collared shirt, white, with a violet vest, a tie, and some black pinstriped slacks, which means he probably had some sort of office job before all of this, making it all the more surprising that he's lasted this long. Last time Carlos checked, office work doesn't teach much in regards to self-defense.

  
However, with the way the man's sleeves are rolled up he can see some spiraling violet edritch tattoos, which probably indicate that the man didn't always work in an office.

  
Unfortunately, that's not any reason to let a strange man inside of his home.

  
He turns away from the window. It's getting late.

  
His room is small, just a little thing with a cot in it for late nights spent in the lab, but habitable. He's been sitting at his desk for the most of today, and has to stretch a bit to loosen up his muscles before making his way to bed. He snags his sleeping meds from the nightstand and a glass of water, favoring his right leg as he sits down.

  
He used to be more nervous about taking them, because they knock him out pretty solidly, thus rendering him incapable of self-defense were he to need it, but then he realized that, given the circumstances, that there are worse ways to go then being murdered in his sleep.

  
He downs a couple of the pills and sets the glass back down, taking a moment to roll onto his back and stare at the ceiling while he debates on whether or not to go to the bathroom before he passes out.

  
He decides not to, simply because his leg hurts and he doesn't want to walk across the apartment right now.

  
He didn't drink much water today anyway.

  
His leg was hurt a few weeks ago. It's broken, he thinks, or getting there, from when he'd had to jump down from the roof of the Ralph's to get away from some of those things, but just staying off of it has proven easier than constantly splinting and resplinting it every time he decides he wants to take a shower.

  
He'd honestly always thought the zombie apocalypse would be more fun. Granted, his math-class day-dreams about it had been more focused around him discovering the cure and whatnot, paying little mind to the whole survival factor of it, and so, obviously less stressful. It's not as if he actually thought there'd be zombies anyway! If he'd known that he needed to properly prepare for them than he probably would have done more research and spent less time being a complete moron.

  
He sighs unhappily and rolls over onto his stomach.

  
He has a whole lab at his disposal, and yet, can't even use it due to the power outage. Not only can he not make the cure, he can't even look to see what's causing the outbreak in the first place.  
Thankfully, the double dose of medication knocks him out before he can stress too much about his purpose in the world.


	2. Purple Eyed Freaks

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Carlos decides to go and check on that strange man from last night.

He sleeps in far too long, doomed to wake with an aching head and a sore back.

  
He rolls onto his side, apparently not having moved at all during the night, and fishes the blanket out from under him to use.

  
It's freezing.

  
God.

  
He manages to open his eyes after a moment, and realizes only a few seconds later that he fell asleep with his glasses on, making his face really hurt because of it.

  
He pulls them off, setting them on the nightstand as he rubs out the stiffness and pain in his cheeks and nose.

  
Fortunately, he's not absolutely blind without them, and so, can afford to leave them off for now, even it makes him feel vulnerable and exposed.

  
He eventually gets brave enough to venture past the warm confines of his bed, and limps down the hall, to the bathroom. There's no hot water, but he always used to use the emergency showers in the lab anyway, so he's used to it.

  
After, he dries off and bundles up in a heather-grey sweater that got left in the lab a few months ago (a personal favorite of his, even if he has no clue who owned it) and a pair of loose grey sweat pants that he used to wear during late night shifts.

  
He slips on his sneakers, checks himself in the mirror, and then makes his way downstairs.

  
It's probably time to check up on that guy.

  
He ends up finding him doubled over on the lawn. There's an obviously fresh bite-mark on his shoulder, and a second located somewhere on his stomach, leeching blood out into the surrounding fabric, while an only partially dead thing lies writhing about a foot behind him. Somehow he seems to have fended it off, but only just.

  
Carlos snags a baseball bat from just inside the laboratory door and sprints over, bringing it sharply down onto the thing's skull, splattering a bit of unwanted viscera across the scene.

  
It's a mystery how these things don't just freeze.

  
Perhaps the decay process produces heat.

  
He makes a note to look into this later.

  
He's snapped from his thoughts as the man lets out an alarmed cry, frantically scrubbing gore from his cheek.

  
Carlos  blinks, studying him for a moment.

  
He has violet eyes.

Fascinating.

  
They _have_ to be contact lenses.

  
After a moment, said eyes roll back into the man's head and he faints again.

  
Carlos groans. He really can't be carrying people with this leg.

  
Karma's a bitch.

  
***

  
The man's skin is freezing, so he decides not to risk washing out his wounds with the cold water from the tap, and instead opts to use one of the bunsen burners downstairs to warm a soapy bowl of it first.

  
He'd been a bit meek about undressing the man at first, but the guy turns out to be really out of it and kind of just doesn't care what he does, so he doesn't either, even if he does feel a bit like a creep about it all.

  
The stomach wound is on his hip, it's a thin, superficial thing that won't even need stitches, much to Carlos' relief. He douses it in a bit of peroxide, eliciting an unhappy whimper from his patient as he gently dabs it clean, but nothing more.

  
The shoulder wound, on the other hand, is in much worse condition than he had anticipated. It's deep, possibly to the bone in some places, and leaking something clear which he doubts is good.

The skin there is hot and swollen, and Carlos can feel it radiating outward across his skin, leaving the man's cheeks flushed and eyes concerningly glazed.

  
Much to his surprise, however, where he had expected to find a wound on the man's neck, due to the blood on his collar from yesterday, he finds nothing.

He groans.

  
So in other words he condemned this man for literally no reason at all.

  
Now's the time to make up for it, he supposes.

  
He refrains from giving the man stitches, instead deciding to just douse the wound in antibiotics as a precautionary measure instead, binding it tightly, before moving on to washing out the grime from his skin and hair with the last of the soapy water in the bowl.

Once done, he towel dries the stranger and helps him back to the bedroom. He seems more aware as the scientist offers him him an oversized black t-shirt that just says "SCIENCE!" on it in neon green puffy paint, and a a pair of glow-in-the-dark solar system pajama pants.

  
The shirt was a gift from some highschool friend who went through a puffypaint phase, and well...the pants were just too cool not to get.

  
At least the man seems to like them.

  
He runs his fingers over a couple of the planets fondly, and lies back in the bed a moment later.

  
He looks endearingly tiny in all of that rumpled fabric, much to Carlos' surprise, but it's something else that catches his attention first.

  
He frowns.

  
"It's not good to sleep with contacts in."

  
"Contacts?" Mumbles back the man, nuzzling against a pillow. "I don't wear contacts. I wear glasses."

  
Carlos frowns.

  
"I meant your cosmetic ones."

  
"Oh..." He trails off.

  
It takes Carlos a moment to realize that the man has actually fallen asleep.

  
He sighs.

  
That fever's definitely gonna be making his eyes stick shut if he doesn't do something about the contact lenses.

  
Ugh. Whatever. Why should he care?

  
He'll address the issue later. Right now he needs to get the guy's fever down in the first place so that his brain doesn't melt or something.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Earl shows up next chapter bbys


	3. Adrenaline

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Things happen and Carlos' leg isn't faring any better.

At first it had baffled Carlos.

  
Cecil's recovery had been inhuman.

Nobody survives bites like that. Nobody.

Usually the infection spreads so swiftly that they die within a few days. Even with a shit ton of antibiotics.

  
He didn't even get a fever. At least, not one worth noting.

  
In the end it turns out that Cecil isn't all that he seems to be.

Which is human, in case anyone was wondering.

  
The violet eyes should have made that obvious enough, but more than anything, it's the tattoos that give it away.

They're alive apparently. Sentient even.

  
This fact came to light when suddenly, one morning, Carlos woke up to find that he had a full sleeve of the things on his arm. Which isn't exactly Cecil's doing, but still.

  
"Usually they come back to me." He had later mumbled when he'd noticed the bare skin of his arm, as if it wasn't that big of a deal.

  
His bad arm, much to the other man's concern.

  
"Parasites are often good indicators of host health." Carlos had fussed, checking for any signs of infection. "Your arm may not be habitable for them anymore! We should check in case the cause of it is hurting you!"

  
The man had just chuckled and let him do his thing.

  
In the end, nothing was wrong after all.

  
According to Cecil they probably just thought Carlos looked cozy.

  
There had been an innuendo in there somewhere, but the scientist hadn't had the energy to fish it out, since half the time Cecil's innuendos are metaphors that only he gets.

  
The flirting is only obvious because he sits there grinning for about ten minutes before he gives up on waiting for a reaction.

  
Cozy.

  
He scoffs.

**-1 Month Later-**

  
Carlos yelps, suddenly slamming face-first into a snow-drift as his leg snags on something buried beneath it.

  
They've been out of the lab for a week, thanks to a (notably suspicious) fire downstairs. Were it not winter, they probably would have just slept outside, but since it is winter, finding new shelter is top priority.

  
Unfortunately, with Carlos' leg still injured, it's been a difficult procession.

  
Even with it splinted and looked after by Cecil every evening it's still getting worse, now to the point that it's now nearly impossible to walk on it.

  
Being a stubborn man, however, he refuses any aid or piggyback rides offered to him, meaning he hasn't rested since they left the lab.

  
Thanks to this they've made little progress in their travels, and have been forced to avoide looking for shelter in the city, due to his inability to outrun the zombies there.

  
Instead theey've been out wandering along the highway, in little more than the clothes on their backs and an old purple afghan that Carlos has a tendency to hoard. Cecil seems oblivious to the cold.

  
What he isn't oblivious to is hunger.

  
They haven't eaten in days.

  
Probably because he doesn't have years worth of practice with forgetting to eat like Carlos does.

  
At noon on the eighth day they finally come across a little farm-house, much to both of their reliefs.

  
It's the first structure they've seen since they left the city.

  
Unfortunately, it's completely empty, as if recently moved out of. Meaning no food.

  
Still, starving takes longer when you can lounge around while you're doing it, so it's still a win, even if Cecil's probably not going to stop moping about it anytime soon.

  
The place is painted white, nearly blending into the snow with only its black shutters announcing its presence to the world.

  
Further inspection reveals that all of its windows have been firmly caulked shut, due to age, as have some of the doors, and that only the side door works.

  
Cecil quickly breaks the lock on it with a nearby rock and pushes it open, stepping inside immediately, pulling Carlos with him.

  
The relief is instantaneous. It's not especially warm, probably lacking insulation, but it's not cold, and the wind doesn't reach them here.

  
Carlos' leg gives out a moment later, thanks to the sudden shift to level ground, forcing Cecil to catch him and pull him up into his arms bridal style, much to his embarrassment.

  
The man smiles.

  
"Let's find you somewhere comfortable to lie down at while I go have a look around, alright?"

  
***

  
Carlos snaps awake, the last dredges of his nightmare fading into a much more comfortable, wood-panelled bedroom with soft brown carpet and no windows. He presses his cheek against said carpet and sighs.

  
It's late, probably three or so, but the combined aching of his leg and stomach seem to have woken him.

  
Cecil is no where in sight, meaning he's probably awake too, a fact which is quickly verified when Carlos hears voices in the hallway.

  
He closes his eyes and listens.

  
This isn't the first time that this has happened, actually.

  
He's woken to the sound of Cecil and his walkie-talkie friend Earl on quite a few different occasions. It's not even something that worries him anymore.

  
The two have apparently been trying to track one another down, but Earl's been taking his sweet time with it. Taking the opportunity to go on a supply run while Cecil recovered from his injuries in your care.

  
It would seem more dickish were it not for the fact that they talk every night and it actually made some sense.

  
No reason in rushing back to a sick boyfriend when he's in perfectly capable hands already.

  
Lately though, now that the lab's gone, Cecil's been trying to urge him along.

  
Unfortunately, meeting up has proven surprisingly difficult thanks to the bad weather and the fact that neither of you actually know where you're at to tell him.

  
Cecil suddenly lets out a delighted squeal of some sort.

  
"Really?! How close are you?!" He cries excitedly. "I'm starving, do you have food?!"

  
"Just a few miles." The man returns evenly, voice muffled by static. "I passed that house not too long ago. And yeah, I've got food, Cees. I'll come get you guys."

 

"Thank God, you don't know how much of a relief this is!"

  
"Of course." Chuckles back the other man. "I wouldn't want my bo- I mean, best friend, to starve, now would I?"

  
Cecil doesn't seem to notice the slip up as he continues to jibber on about how close to starving they both were, but Carlos does.

  
He's just too tired to do much besides process the information.

  
The man had nearly said something else, Maybe he's an ex?

  
Carlos just snorts, remembering something about Cecil mentioning the fact that the man was a boyscout leader.

  
Lame.

  
He nuzzles his head into his blanket and sighs, only to frown a moment or so later.

  
Is a scientist really any better?

  
***

  
Once again, it's the pain in his leg that wakes him.

  
The cause of it, however, is not at as unprovoked as last time.

  
Somebody's touching it.

  
Actually, no.

  
Not touching it, moving it, and also squeezing it, and just making it hurt in general.

  
He kicks feebly with his good leg and rolls over onto his back to get a good look at them.

 

Cecil's sitting to his right, eating a poptart, making it obvious that it wasn't him who did it.

  
"Early!" He cries, in the direction of the true culprit, a thin looking redhead with an exasperated look on his face. "You hurt him!"

  
Carlos had actually expected someone more impressive, weirdly enough.

  
This guy hardly looks older than twenty-five. Maybe it's the freckles, or his size, but something tells him that more than anything it's probably the boy-scout uniform he has on.

  
The man makes eye contact with him at some point.

 

Red and black.

  
Probably not human then.

  
"Uh, hi." Carlos, mumbles, trying to sound uninterested as he bites back a ,"Can I do tests on you?!" and sits up. "I'm Carlos."

  
His eyes narrow and he growls.

  
"Hold. Still. For fuck's sake!"

  
Ooh. Scary.

  
And just like that, he goes right back to fiddling with the scientist's leg, much to the main's disdain.

  
***

  
"The tub's full of hot water." Earl mutters once he's finished with the physical. He says it about as curtly as he seems to say everything. "So take a bath."

  
Carlos sighs, wondering if it would get on the guy's nerves if he asked how the water was heated.

  
He decides not to, but figures it out in the end anyway when he finds a freshly-lit wood-burning stove in the kitchen.

  
***

  
Earl turning out to be a douche aside, the water actually feels pretty amazing, even if it does make his leg hurt ungodly bad.

  
He sits in the water for a little while and relaxes, relaxing, as the others go about their business outside.

  
At some point the thought crosses his mind that they may have just left him here on his own, but this is quickly proven wrong when he hears them talking in the kitchen a few minutes later.  
"Cecil." The redhead snaps, sounding a bit frustrated.

  
He hears Cecil respond with a disinterested, "Sorry, what?" A second or so later.

  
Earl lets out an exasperated sigh. "You're not listening!"

  
"Fine, fine, go over it again for me."

  
Carlos finds himself somewhat automatically leaning in to eavesdrop.

  
"We need to get your friend antibiotics." He finally hisses back, voice barely audible through the door. "And soon, or else his leg's gonna go bad."

  
Carlos winces.

  
Bad?

  
That's a good way to put it.

  
He'd already known this of course,. it's fairly obvious, especially now that the break is close to becoming compounded, but for some reason he'd thought ignoring it would make it go away.  
The injury looks kind of gross now that he thinks about it. All black and purple like it is.

 

"Oh." Cecil replies eventually. "I...didn't realize it was that bad."

  
He sounds strangely heartbroken.

  
***

  
Neither of them mention anything about the infection, surprisingly.

  
Cecil seems just as companionable as ever, despite his earlier unhappiness, but Carlos can feel the tension in the air.

  
The cause of it, however, may actually just be the fact that Earl is still brooding.

  
God.

  
He sounded so much more cheerful on the walkie-talkie.

  
A long, awkward silence stretches out as Cecil stares out the passenger window and Earl watches the road ahead, leaving Carlos in the back-seat with only his thoughts to keep him company as he gets increasingly car-sick.

  
The vehicle was clearly stocked with the intention of housing only two people, in the way that the supplies have been haphazardly reorganized in an attempt to squeeze him inside. Forcing him to sit cramped between a stack of sleeping bags and a stack of coolers.

  
He eyes the coolers suspiciously, half afraid that they're going to fall on him with every turn, and presses his head against the sleeping bags behind him.

  
His leg has begun to hurt again, but he makes in effort to ignore it as he tries to force himself into a nap.

  
Earl notices.

  
"Do you ever wonder why you can feel fine one day, but wake up with a cold the next?" He suddenly asks, peeking into the rearview mirror.

  
"Uh, what?"

  
He continues, indifferent to the scientist's confusion.

 

"It's because your adrenaline shuts down while you're sleeping, giving bad things an opportunity to spread."

  
He vaguelly remember his grandmother saying something like that.

  
It's because of this that he nearly chalks the idea up as a wive's tale, but he doesn't, deciding that it's better to be safe than sorry.

  
"Fine." He concedes quietly, rubbing his eyes.

  
He should have napped in his bath.

  
"You'll be fine." Earl suddenly murmurs, much to his surprise.

  
It's nearly too quiet to be heard, but he catches it anyway, and something tells him that it's true.


	4. Just Barely Better

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Carlos' leg is in worse shape than they originally thought

Everything is _not_ alright.

  
_He_ is not alright.

  
"S...stop that!" Carlos simpers, swatting Earl away for probably the fourth time this morning. He's sick of them messing with his leg like this!

  
The scoutmaster's expression is unreadable, which isn't a good sign.

  
It hadn't been as difficult as they'd originally thought it would be to track down the antibiotics, but it seems that they may have taken too long with it anyway with as bad as his leg's gotten.

  
Earl is checking him over to determine if that's true or not, having made a stop specially to do, at the first house they came across, which they're now sitting in the bedroom of.

  
The warmth of the day has already begun to get the zombies riled up, causing them to mill about outside the window, to the extent that Carlos almost wonders if they can smell his weakness.

  
Earl, still blank-faced, turns his attention to said zombies.

  
"Cecil." He begins quietly without looking over. "Sit with Carlos. I'll be back in a moment."

  
The man chokes, looking about five shades paler than usual, which is quite the feat if you do say so yourself, but nods anyway, mute and apparently in some form of shock.

  
Earl leaves without another word, only to eventually reappear on the other side of the window with a crowbar and hand and an apparent need to bash in those things heads.

  
The scientist swallows thickly, feeling a bit sick as he forces himself to think about nicer things, which is hard, considering.

  
It's either he watch...that. Or he think about his leg, which he's just made the mistake of looking at again, shit.

  
He shivers.

  
It's black.

  
Shit. Shit. Shit.

  
How could he have ever been dumb enough to think that walking on it was a good idea?!

  
It could just be bruised, right? Right?!

  
He bursts into tears despite himself.

  
Gangrene is a serious condition! There's no way that they'll be able to treat this!

  
He's going to die!

  
***

  
This is worse. He thinks.

  
Worse than dying, at least.

  
"A...amputate?!" He practically wails as Earl wordlessly sifts through his backpack, probably in search of something to mutilate him with.

 

His face remains blank.

  
It finally occurs to Carlos what he's doing.

  
He's distancing himself!

  
He thinks he's going to die, too!

  
"If you don't let me amputate." He finally responds, voice flat. "I'll shoot you. It's a more humane death."

  
"W...what?!" He sobs, very nearly on the verge of a panic attack.

  
Apparently unconcerned, Earl produces a brown glass bottle of what might be peroxide, and pours it onto a rag.

  
"What's that f....for?!"

  
He glances over cooly and sits down on the bed beside the scientist, expression unwavering as he shoves the rag over the scientist's mouth and nose with about as much grace as the action can be done with.

  
"Chloroform."

  
***

  
His heart is beating rapidly, and his breath is escaping in frantic gasps. It's dark, and his head feels light and empty. A sharp pain is radiating from somewhere in the darkness, making his skin clammy and his stomach twist, and his ears are ringing with blood.

  
Somebody presses a cool rag to his cheek, and just like that, the sensation shocks him back into reality.

  
He snaps his eyes open, but immediately regrets it as the world begins to spin to the point that he's heaving up what little he's had to eat over the side of the bed.

  
He groans and slumps back against his pillow after a moment. His face feels numb, but something tells him that it's all in his head.

  
It occurs to him at some point that sleeping on his belly might be more comfortable than on his back, but he doesn't have the energy to roll over as Cecil, who's apparently sitting beside him, goes back to wiping his face with that washcloth.

  
At no point does he make any attempt to talk to Carlos, but that's not a bad thing with as bad as his head is aching right now.

  
It takes a few minutes for his reality to set in, for his mind to finally locate the source of the pain in his body, for him to remember what happened.

  
His leg. Right.

  
He doesn't want to look.

  
He doesn't want to look.

  
He doesn't-

  
He looks, and almost immediately regrets it. A loud shriek startles both him and Cecil, and it takes a moment for his brain to process that, yes, it was he who screamed, but not without a good reason.

  
His leg's gone. From the knee down. This is horrible.

  
They stole it!

  
Cecil's eyes go wide.

 

"C...Carlos?" He stammers quietly, shrinking away. "A....are you okay?"

  
Listening to the sound of his voice makes the man's head spin.

  
He doesn't know what to say, he can't wrap his mind around this.

  
"H...how did he...I don't...how..?"

  
Clearly empathetic, Cecil goes back to wiping his already feverish skin down with the rag again.

  
"Earl's got a-lot of training...." He explains. "In everything, really. He's probably even done this before."

 

He jerks away from the man.

  
They stole his leg.

 

Jesus fucking Christ.

  
This is sick.

  
"Is he awake?" Cuts in another voice from somewhere else, this one tinny and foreign to his ringing ears. There's a moment of pause, after which the newcomer adds, "I don't do vomit."  
Cecil clicks his tongue somewhat disapprovingly, but climbs out of the bed anyway, allowing the interloper, Earl, it turns out, to take his place beside the "patient".

  
"There's cat litter in the hall closet." He offers quietly, taking the man's wrist for a moment until he's certain he got the message. Cecil nods quietly, pulling away after a moment.

  
He leaves.

  
After a moment, Earl lies down beside Carlos.

  
"Does it hurt?"

  
The other man groans noncommittally in response.

  
It actually isn't too painful. Not as painful as he'd expect it to be, at least, but it's not's pleasant either. It's the sort of pain that slowly drives a person insane, like the first prick of a needle that just doesn't go away. His stomach twists at the thought, but he forces himself to keep himself collected for pride's sake.

  
The scout master reaches over to pet his cheek when he doesn't respond, and sighs, "You've got to take care of it this time." He warns. "Because if you keep getting infections like that, I'm going to have to shoot you. It's already gonna be hard enough taking care of you like this, so really try your best to stay healthy."

  
Carlos sucks in a deep breath and grits his teeth.

  
He doesn't need threats right now.

  
Earl frowns.  
"Sorry, um, didn't mean to kick you while you were down..." He murmurs. "We'll look after. You'll be fine. We'll make you better. Just try not to let your pride get in the way of your healing again. If something hurts, or you need help, please ask for it."

  
Knowing that he's right, and also that none of this probably would have happened had he simply accepted Cecil's offer to carry him, he exhales, and closes his eyes.

  
"I will...um, t....thanks for saving me."

  
"Don't thank me."

  
He nods numbly.

  
His resentment has mostly faded, but that doesn't mean he's grateful. Even if it did save his life.

  
Earl seems to understand that.

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry  
> I'm cruel  
> I know  
> lol  
> I probably should have mentioned that my Carlos headcanon usually has a fake leg, so in most of my stories he's gonna lose his real one if he hasn't already

**Author's Note:**

> You can find me at: http://kevin-the-chicken.tumblr.com  
> Feel free to drop a Kudos or a comment uvu


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